RUSH: Now, let’s go to Meet the Press yesterday. Rachel Maddow, the left trumpets her as the smartest, the most able, the most articulate, the most brilliant, shining star pundit on the left. Rachel Maddow was on Meet the Press with Rich Lowry, who is the editor of National Review. And Dan Balz, who’s a Washington Post columnist or reporter, you’ll hear him in the two sound bites coming up. They were talking about Medicare and Medicare cuts, and Lowery starts it all off.

LOWRY: This whole idea the Obama campaign and the Democrats have been pushing that Romney, because he hasn’t said what deductions and loopholes specifically he’s gonna close — which no presidential campaign ever does — therefore he’s gonna raise taxes on the middle class to pay for lowering rates, is an utterly … a fantasy made out of utter whole cloth.

MADDOW: (stammering) Paul Ryan was on the Simpson-Bowles Commission and dissented from it because it did raise revenue [taxes]. He dropped out. He blew that up. He blew up the Gang of Six. He got zero Democratic votes for any of his budgets.

BALZ: Not only because he did not think it went far enough on health care.

MADDOW: Right. In terms of the cuts.

LOWRY: And that’s the key thing. Even President Obama, who’s cut $700 billion from Medicare — which I guess you support —

LOWRY: Do you support $700 billion in cuts in Medicare over the next ten years?

MADDOW: I’m not running for president.

LOWRY: Do you?

MADDOW: Paul Ryan’s running for —

LOWRY: Do you?

MADDOW: I’m not running for anything.

LOWRY: Do you? Why can’t you answer?

MADDOW: Paul Ryan is running —

LOWRY: Why can’t you answer?

MADDOW: — for vice president!

LOWRY: See? You can’t answer.

RUSH: That’s right. She couldn’t answer. She’s paid for her opinion. She’s paid to have an opinion on this stuff. She’s paid to have a far left-wing, extreme, socialist opinion on it. She says, “I’m not running! I’m not running! Paul Ryan, it’s up to him to explain himself.” No, I’m asking you: Do you support Obama’s $700 billion cuts in Medicare? Not Ryan’s. Not Romney’s. Obama’s! Obama cuts $700 billion from Medicare. Do you support them? “I’m not running, Paul Ryan is! I’m not running, Paul Ryan is!” No, no, no, What do you think? “I’m not running. Paul Ryan’s running.”

“See? You can’t answer.”

And it continued. Lowry kept going…

MADDOW: I’m not running for anything, okay?

LOWRY: This goes to the key vulnerability.

MADDOW: Hold on…

LOWRY: Democrats have cut $700 billion out of Medicare —

MADDOW: Which the — the Republicans would cut, too.

LOWRY: — and you won’t, or can’t, defend it.

MADDOW: (silence)

LOWRY: Defend it!

MADDOW: Is it good…?

LOWRY: Do you support it?

MADDOW: Is it good or bad?

LOWRY: Do you support it?

MADDOW: Listen…

LOWRY: Do you support it? You can’t answer.

MADDOW: But, wait!

LOWRY: You can’t answer.

MADDOW: Why are you asking me if I support it?

LOWRY: You can’t answer.

MADDOW: Wait. Does Paul…?

LOWRY: Because you’re an opinion-maker who’s supposed to give us your opinions —

MADDOW: My opinions for being president?

LOWRY: — and you will not tell us what your opinion on that is.

MADDOW: What I want to know is the logic of —

LOWRY: Democrats cannot defend that.

RUSH: You note one thing missing in that? Neither Dan Balz nor Rachel Maddow denied that Obama cut $700 billion out of Medicare. Now, I know what the conventional wisdom is about the Ryan budget, that it cuts Medicare, that it “ends Medicare as we know it.” I’m sorry, it’s Obamacare that does that — and not just ends Medicare as we know it, it ends America as we know it!

Ryan saves it. Now (chuckles), you want to have an argument whether it should be saved or not, that’s for another day. But just within the context of this, the prime defender — throw Balz in there, two prime defenders — of Obama, prime defenders of the regime did not even try to refute that Obamacare cuts $700 billion out of Medicare.